Abiding in the Vine

How many gardeners do we have in the room?

We are just around the corner from spring, aren’t we?

The warm days over the last few weeks have even made some flowers begin to poke their heads out of the ground.

We tried our hand at gardening a few years, but it isn’t our favorite.

The first year we tried, we planted a bunch of cucumbers, not realizing how big those vines got. I felt like I was constantly having to untangle them, cut them back, or look through them to see if any cucumbers were growing.

I am not a great gardener, but I am familiar enough with it to appreciate the picture Jesus gives us in John 15.

In fact, go ahead and open your Bibles to John 15:1, which should be on page 958 in the black Bible in the back of the pew in front of you.

Jesus is talking with his disciples on the last night of before he is going to be crucified and die for the sins of the world.

He is not going to be with his disciples anymore in the same way he has been, so he is giving them instructions on how to live once he leaves them physically.

Here, he is outlining for them the key to living a fruitful life.

We will talk more about what he means by that as we go through the message, but from the beginning, let’s acknowledge that Jesus’s view of a fruitful life isn’t a great job, a good-looking spouse and kids, a nice house on a quiet street, and a healthy retirement account. He may give you those things along the way, but that isn’t the fruit he is looking to produce through you.

As we will see, the fruit he is looking for is the fruit of his work in our hearts that leads us to act and behave in a certain manner.

If you and I are going to live lives that Jesus would call fruitful, then we must root our lives in Jesus.

In fact, I want to challenge you to remember this this week: Root your life in Jesus.

Let’s read verses 1-10 to hear Jesus explain this picture, and we will go back and look at several important truths.

Jesus starts by identifying himself as the “true vine” in verse 1.

Most likely, he is referring back to times in the Old Testament when the nation of Israel was referred to as either a vineyard or a vine.

One of those passages is Isaiah 5:1-7, where God talks about planting a vineyard and expecting it to bear good fruit. No matter how well he cared for it, though, the vineyard never did what it should have, and eventually, it was destroyed. He concludes that section by saying,

Isaiah 5:7 CSB

For the vineyard of the Lord of Armies is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah, the plant he delighted in. He expected justice but saw injustice; he expected righteousness but heard cries of despair.

Israel was supposed to be God’s special people, but they never lived up to what they were supposed to be.

Now, Jesus has established that he is the true vine, the one that Israel was supposed to be.

Jesus has been perfect every moment of his life. He has always been just, he has always obeyed the Father, and he has never sinned.

He is the true vine who submits to the Father and gives life to the branches, which is us!

So, then, if you and I are going to bear fruit that honors God, we have to root our lives in him.

We are branches that, as we will explain, cannot bear fruit in and of ourselves.

Because of that, there are at least three action steps that are a part of rooting our lives in Jesus.

First, if we are rooting our lives in Jesus, we must:

1) Submit to the Father’s pruning.

Look back at verses 1-2...

First, let’s talk about the branches that don’t bear fruit. We see them again in verse 6.

When we put these verses in context with the rest of what the Bible teaches, it seems that branches that don’t bear fruit are those who look like they follow Jesus but really have no part in him.

The clearest example of this is Judas, who may be who Jesus has in mind when he gave this illustration.

He looked like he was a branch, but as we have seen, he was not really connected to Jesus. He didn’t honor Jesus; he betrayed him and had him arrested.

I can never be certain of anyone’s salvation, or relationship to God, outside of my own—the Bible makes it clear that I can know that I am right with God because of what Jesus has done.

If you see someone whose life isn’t bearing fruit, you and must recognize that Jesus says they are not in him.

That is something you ought to pray hard about and bring up in loving conversation when possible, out of a concern for their soul. This isn’t coming out of a sense of superiority or judgment; rather, we would tenderly call people to examine if they really are in Christ.

So, what about those of us who are in Christ? We, like the disciples, have been made clean by his word, like he says in verse 3?

We need to submit ourselves to the Father’s pruning.

If you have a live plant, you know that the vast majority of the time, they need some maintenance. You break off old leaves and dead flowers, treat for bugs, remove diseased sections, and you do it all to make the plant healthier.

In the similar way, our Father prunes us.

By the way, “prunes” and “clean” are from the same root word.

You see that branches are made even more fruitful as the Father cleans them through the Word.

Although you have already been saved, there is a continual pruning that should be taking place in your life. The Father should be putting his finger on areas of sin, removing things that you have held on to unhealthily, and making sure you are growing and healthy.

The writer of Hebrews deals with this kind of pruning towards the end of his letter.

In the beginning of Hebrews 12, he calls us to:

Hebrews 12:1 CSB

Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us,

Notice that he seems to make a distinction between “sin” and “hindrances”.

Sin is anything that displeases God or goes against his law, good or bad.

There are also hindrances that may not rise to the level of sin, but they distract us and keep us from living for Christ fully.

He calls us to lay all those aside, and then goes into more detail later in the chapter:

Hebrews 12:5–7 CSB

And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons: My son, do not take the Lord’s discipline lightly or lose heart when you are reproved by him, for the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he receives. Endure suffering as discipline: God is dealing with you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline?

Here, we can think of discipline as pruning.

If you are a true branch, he will keep pruning you, just like a father disciplines his child.

Have you ever been in Walmart and heard a child in the next aisle? Odds are you said “Glad that isn’t my kid!” or something similar.

Why? Because if they aren’t my child, I don’t need to discipline them.

However, when it is one of my children throwing a fit, I have a responsibility to discipline them in such a way that they learn that their behavior is unacceptable.

Wouldn’t we expect our Heavenly Father to do the same?

Part of rooting my life in Christ is recognizing and responding to the Father’s pruning in my life.

Let me ask you: when was the last time God clearly convicted you that something you were doing was wrong?

If you can’t remember a time where you didn’t just feel guilty because you got caught doing something wrong, but instead, your heart was broken over the fact that you were sinning against the God who made you, then you need to take a hard look at your life.

God disciplines his children, so if he isn’t discipling you, you may not be his child!

You may not be genuinely connected to the vine.

If God is convicting you, how are you handling it? Are you surrendering that area of life to his control and working in his strength to do what he says, or are you just trying to numb the feeling of conviction?

Rooting our lives in Jesus means we surrender to his pruning.

Rooting our lives in him also means we must...

2) Abide in Jesus.

Look at what Jesus says in verse 4...

Other translations render the word “remain” as “abide” or “live with”.

I wanted to use “abide” because there is something different about that to me than just “remain”.

It isn’t a word we use often, but it really is the idea of living with someone.

If you and I are going to bear fruit, we have to root every aspect of our lives in him.

We cannot bear any lasting fruit without him.

If you cut a branch that is not connected to a trunk, even if your intent is to prune it, you will destroy that branch.

Why? Because it does not have the power to heal, grow, or change in and of itself; it must stay connected to the trunk.

In a similar way, you cannot endure pruning if you are not staying connected to the life-source of the Son.

This isn’t saying that you can lose your salvation. However, this points to the fact that genuine believers will remain plugged-in to the life-giving flow of Christ.

Although not perfectly or with complete consistency, a true believer will stay plugged in to growing in Christ.

You should be able to look back 1, 2, 5 years and say, “This is who I was in Christ. This is what I understood about him, but this is what he has taught me, this is who he has made me to be...”

If you can’t, then you really need to take a look at whether or not you are connected to the vine at all.

If you know you are connected and you don’t seem to be growing, then go back to the first part—are you letting God prune you?

By the way, although there is a beautiful spiritual union with Christ that we enjoy as we remain in him, there are a few clear tests for us out of this passage.

From verse 7 - Am I remaining in his word, reading and applying it regularly?

From verse 9 - Is my identity rooted in Christ’s love for me, and does that love show itself in my relationships with God, myself, and others?

From verse 11 - Am I full of the same joy that Jesus had that was rooted in faith in the Father’s plan? Would my roommates or my family agree?

Remaining in Christ means that his word, his live, and his joy are continually a part of who we are in a growing way.

As the Father prunes and cleans us, our lives become more and more rooted in him, which leads to our final action:

3) Bear fruit.

Go back to verses 4-5....

There is a great emphasis in this passage on what the branch produces. What does that fruit mean? Does that mean I need to be leading someone to Christ every day?

Although sharing the gospel and seeing people come to Christ is definitely a fruit that should come from our lives, that isn’t the only kind of fruit God is calling us to live.

Perhaps the clearest picture of this is in Galatians 5:22-23. Paul just finished going through what life looks like when we live apart from Christ, and then he says:

Galatians 5:22–23 CSB

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The law is not against such things.

These are the kinds of fruit that God is calling you and I to produce.

This goes back to what we just said, doesn’t it? If you and I are rooted in Christ, we will live lives that are increasingly marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

There are other fruits, such as seeking justice for the poor and oppressed, living honest lives, praying for your enemies, and more.

You and I are called to bear fruit—to let the life Jesus has given us pour out in our attitudes and actions toward God, ourselves, and others.

Here’s the thing: you aren’t doing this on your own!

That’s what the Pharisees in Jesus’s day had been trying to do. They were trying to bear fruit without abiding. They were trying to do all the good things they could in their own strength, not realizing they were not actually connected to God.

There may be people here this morning or watching online who are doing the exact same thing.

Remember the order of all this:

Ephesians 2:8–10 CSB

For you are saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift— not from works, so that no one can boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time for us to do.

God gives salvation to you as a gift, and then you live out that gift by doing what God has set in front of you.

None of this is in your power, because the only way you can bear lasting fruit is by staying connected to the vine.

That happens as we wake up every morning and surrender ourselves afresh to him, asking him to prune away anything that isn’t going to honor him, no matter how painful that may be.

We continue to abide in him as we pray before we go into a meeting, we pray with our families before we head out in the morning and when we gather around the table for dinner at night.

We seek his forgiveness when we do something rotten instead of bearing good fruit, and we get back up and keep moving toward the goal of bearing fruit for him.

Look at what the ultimate goal of our fruitfulness is…Jesus explains it in verse 8.

We submit to the Father’s pruning and root our lives deeply in Jesus so that our every attitude, thought, action, and reaction gives him glory and proves that we are his disciples.

Why? Because Jesus was willing to sacrifice himself on the cross for us.

His life bore more fruit than anyone ever could, yet he loved us enough that he was willing to lay it down on the cross, bearing not just the pruning of the Father but the punishment that we rightly deserved, and died in my place.

He rose from the grave, showing his victory over sin, and now he rules and reigns in heaven, inviting us to serve him in his kingdom and bear fruit.

Now, those of us who have been connected to him and live in him seek to root our lives more deeply in who he is and what he has done so we can be pruned, abiding with him, and bearing fruit for his glory.